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Difference Between Verbs and Nouns

Verbs vs Nouns
 

Verbs and nouns play a huge role in English grammar making it necessary to know the difference between verbs and nouns. In fact, both of them are two kinds of parts of speech used in grammar. A verb denotes action whereas a noun denotes a name. If you look at the terms nouns and verbs these two are the plural form of the terms noun and verb respectively. The word verb has its origins in the Late Middle English while the word noun also has its origin in Late Middle English. Without understanding the difference between verbs and nouns, which are basic parts of speech, one cannot expect to be good in the English language.

What is a Noun?

A noun denotes the name of a person, a place or a thing as in the words Francis, London and chair. Francis is the name of a person, London is the name of a place and chair is the name of a thing. Hence, all the three words are called as nouns. It is interesting to know that nouns and verbs combine to form complete sentences. Observe the two sentences given below.

Francis reads a book.

Angela gives a fruit to Adam.

In the first sentence, you can find that Francis is a noun. In the same way, in the second sentence, Angela is the noun and In fact, in the second sentence, you can find another noun called fruit. It takes the position of the object in a sentence. Hence, it is understood that nouns can be used either as a subject or as an object in a sentence. When you observe this, you can understand that both the subject and object can be termed as nouns.

What is a Verb?

A verb, on the other hand, denotes any kind of action such as ‘eating’, ‘dancing’, ‘writing’, ‘swimming’ and the like. Words called verbs can explain anything that we do or perform.  It is interesting to know that nouns and verbs combine to form complete sentences. Observe the two sentences given below.

Francis reads a book.

Angela gives a fruit to Adam.

In the first sentence, reads is a verb and both of them are used nicely in completing a sentence. In the second sentence, the word gives is a verb and both of them combine nicely to form a complete sentence. Moreover, a verb normally connects a subject to an object.

What is the difference between Verbs and Nouns?

• A verb denotes action whereas a noun denotes a name. This is the main difference between the two parts of speech, namely verbs and nouns.

• A noun denotes the name of a person, a place or a thing.

• A verb, on the other hand, denotes any kind of action.

• Words called verbs can explain anything that we do or perform.

• Nouns and verbs combine to form complete sentences.

• Nouns can be used either as a subject or as an object in a sentence.

• A verb normally connects a subject to an object. On the other hand, both the subject and object can be termed as nouns.

These are the differences between verbs and nouns.

Images Courtesy:

  1. Verbs example by Tjo3ya (CC BY-SA 3.0)